Irene knew that going back into the forest alone (not counting the phone in her hand, cracked but still recording just fine) was probably- no, definitely a terrible idea.

But Irene also knew that there had been more to that living pile of dirt and branches than a family of rabbits, no matter what Aden thought, and she wanted to prove it, to learn the truth of what lay within the forest.

She had her phone, she had her radio, she would be fine. Probably. Hopefully.

“So, my big monster-hunting trek with Aden yesterday was... kind of a bust.” Irene laughed a little to herself at that understatement. Aden probably thought she was crazy before, if he hadn’t already come to that conclusion. “Maybe the problem was that two of us were there, and it didn’t want to show itself to both of us at once--strength in numbers and all that. Maybe I have to be alone to see it.”

Irene clutched her phone tightly as she added, “Well, I’m not entirely alone, am I? I have you, Rose. I’m recording this for you, after all, even if... if you’ll probably never hear it.”

A soft sigh emerged from Irene’s lips as she approached the spot where she’d seen the monster before. “The pile is still there, same as before. Doesn’t look like much right now, not when it’s standing still. I can see how Aden thought it was just a rabbit’s warren, though I still think... well, this should help me figure out the truth, one way or another.”

Irene looked at the pile of dirt and branches for a moment before turning around, making a point of looking away from it. “Aden was right about one thing, though, staring at it probably isn’t going to help. I was looking away when it started moving before, so...”

Irene waited for a moment, watching the trees shake in the breeze. The branches behind her rustled, the noise growing as she hesitated to look back.

“Okay, let’s see. If it really is just a bunch of rabbits living in there, I swear-”

Irene never got the chance to finish that sentence.

The ground underneath the branches moved and swelled, and Irene had to suppress her initial instinct to run away--she’d done that already, and it hadn’t gotten her any answers, only a series of new questions that remained unanswered. Instead, she watched the mass of dirt rise and writhe, moving slowly but steadily in her direction-

Until its movement suddenly because fast and steady, faster than Irene could manage to outrun (especially with her ankle still aching from the previous day’s fall), and this time, when the chase was over, Irene wasn’t the victor.

Her phone flew out of her hand, falling unceremoniously to the forest floor and shattering; Irene winced at the sight of it, even as the ground pulled her under. Aden was right, she should have backed up all of her recordings, but, well, it was too late now.

The earth engulfed her, and soon Irene was falling and falling and falling, with thickly-packed dirt on all sides of her, no sign of when her fall was going to end-

Until it suddenly did, leaving her on... was that a wood floor?

The landing wasn’t as bad as Irene had feared, but then, that wasn’t saying much. At least she was still conscious at the end of it all. At least she was able to get up afterwards, even if it made her muscles groan.

“I... I don’t know where I am now. Under the dirt, somewhere, it pulled me in, but it- it looks just like someone’s house, with light streaming through all the cracks in the walls. And symbols. Lots of weird symbols all over the walls... maybe Valencia would recognize them all, but I sure don’t.” Irene laughed at that, a sharp ugly laugh.

“I don’t know why I’m still talking to you. Even if my phone’s still working somewhere, there’s no way it could hear me from down here... it won’t have any of this, it’ll just seem like I... disappeared.”

Irene paused for a moment as the words sank in.

“Is that what happened to you, Rose? One mishap, one run-in with the wrong monster, and then you’re gone forever? Do they even have monsters like that in Seattle?” Irene made herself laugh, though she wasn’t feeling it.

“I don’t know what these symbols mean, I was kind of hoping one of them would look like a rose, that I could take that as some sort of- of cosmic sign or whatever, but no such luck. There is a rabbit, though, made of white light, shining through the wood. Follow the white rabbit, right? Like in Alice in Wonderland? It’s as good a plan as any, I figure.”

The rabbit symbols were all facing the same way, so Irene wandered in that direction, examining the area around her as she walked. The walls looked like those of an old wooden house, but some of them were leaking water through the seams, while others had--was that a deer there, hiding in the walls?

Whatever this was, it was definitely not a normal house, even if it might have looked that way at a glance.

The first door is the door of stone.

Out of nowhere, a wall of stone appeared in front of Irene--a wall of stone that, upon closer examination, she recognized.

“Oh, it’s--remember that park by our house that closed after sunset, or said it did, with the gate and those big stone walls? I can- I can see the mark you made here, Rose, from that time you stepped wrong when we were breaking in, and that one chunk of rock came off, and you sprained your ankle getting down after... what is that doing here?”

Irene shook her head. “Doesn’t matter, I suppose. What matters is, there’s something engraved on it now, and I know that wasn’t there before. It says...”

“My first is in fire, in frenzy and fame,

My last is in knowledge, in kindness, in knack.

A silence is central to knowing my name,

An absence once heard within learning or lack.

My whole is a term used for calling one’s kin,

And calling us, too, if you dare to begin.”

Irene let out a long sigh. “Christ, it’s a riddle. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t a goddamned riddle-”

A deep breath, slowly exhaled, then another. “It’s fine, I can do this, I can handle this. Let’s see. Fire, frenzy, fame--all start with F, so it must be a word starting with that... and ending with K, then? Though two of those are silent Ks, good thing this was written out so I could see them... maybe that’s what that whole ‘silence is central’ thing is about, a, a silent letter in the center of the word?”

Irene started pacing back and forth, though her eyes remained fixed on the wall. “Starts with F, ends in K, silent letter somewhere in there probably... unless it’s a word that means silence or something instead... ‘an absence once heard within learning or lack’... a silent L, maybe, or, or they’ve both got the letter A too I guess? ‘Calling one’s kin’... ‘calling us too’... it’d be a lot easier if I knew who this ‘us’ was in the first place...”

Irene ran one finger against the cold stone of the wall as she paced. “F, L, K... throw a vowel in there, you get falk, felk, filk, folk, fulk... Folk, is that it? Calling one’s kin, like, folks... or, or maybe the ‘us’ is supposed to be the fair folk, from old-timey folklore, or something?”

The door rumbled before disappearing as abruptly as it had appeared in the first place, and Irene stepped forward into the space it had been occupying, continuing to head in the direction that the rabbit symbols were facing.

“Okay. See, I said I could handle it, right? There you go. Riddle: handled.”

Not long after, though, another wall appeared, this one made of darkened brick.

“...I jinxed it, didn’t I? Of course. Of course we weren’t done with the riddles. That’d be too easy. Alright, what do we have here...”

“My first is a pronoun, assumed when untold,

That rhymes with another that’s hidden behind.

My second is beauty man coaxed to unfold,

A thing once created for others to find.

I live in your insides, in shadow and bone,

Yet I carry tidings of love when I’m shown.”

Another deep sigh. “Alright, uh. pronouns. We’ve got I, me, you, he, she, they... ‘assumed when untold’ could be a lot of those, really... But rhyming you’ve just got he, she, me... I guess some people use he as the default? Unless it’s not a pronouns it’s rhyming with, but I’m not sure what else ‘another that’s hidden behind’ could be... so, starting with he, maybe?”

“‘Beauty man coaxed to unfold’... nope, not getting that bit, though I’m guessing it’s another word. So, two words, first one is he... ‘I live in your insides’, ick... wait, ‘tidings of love’... hearts are inside of us, but they’re symbols of love... He, art- art is beauty... Is that it? Heart?”

Again, the wall rumbled and fell away, and Irene walked forward.

This time, though, the corridor ended not in front of another wall, but in front of a door.

The third door is the door of nature.

“Is that my office door? Sure looks the part, though it’s a pretty generic-looking door I guess, just plain wood... and, yup, we’ve got another riddle:”

“I once went above, heading towards the sky,

But also am found growing close to the ground.

As past becomes present, no longer I fly,

And much has been made of my name’s simple sound.

One lost but not found, one here and yet far,

I know that you seek me, wherever you are.”

“These just keep getting tougher, don’t they?” Irene shook her head with a shaky laugh. “‘Past becomes present’... so it, it used to fly, to go upwards, but it doesn’t anymore? And now it’s near the ground? ‘Simple sound’, so probably a short word...”

Irene leaned against the wooden door, letting out a long breath as she looked at the carved letters. “I bet you’re better at riddles than I am, Rose. You always did like wordplay and such, you’d probably have this figured out in a heartbeat...”

A beat, and then it clicked. “Wait- Rose. Rose as in rising, but past tense, grows near the ground, ‘a rose by any other name’... ‘One lost but not found, one here and yet far’... I am seeking you, Rose. I always will. Is that you, Rose? Are you the answer?”

The door squeaked open, and Irene saw a chaotic scene unfolding behind it.

It looked like there was a party of some sort going on there. Music, lights, all the stops pulled out. But a lot of the guests looked far from your usual party-goers, and some of them didn’t even look human...

Irene took a few tentative steps forward, but she didn’t even notice the door closing behind her.

No, what she noticed was a familiar face chatting with two extravagantly-dressed woman Irene didn’t know, a face that made Irene’s heart ache and yet also made it whole again.

“Rose?”

“Irene!”